Ivan L. Preston

The FTC's handling of puffery and other selling claims made “by implication”

Abstract The Federal Trade Commissions handling of alleged false advertising representations that are made by implication is examined. Alleged false advertising presentations are held to be implied to the public by the advertiser even though they are not literally stated in his advertisement. The FTC has extended its reach over this kind of misrepresentation in recent years. Cases for 1970–76 are identified, and a catalog is developed of ten types of implications that have been attacked as deceptive during this period. Some, such as the Expansion Implication, are types established as deceptive in earlier years; others, such as the Reasonable Basis Implication, were not attacked prior to the 1970s. Some types, such as the Uniqueness Implication, have been given considerable publicity; others, such as the Inconspicuous Context Implication, are newly categorized in this paper. The consequences of FTCs identification of these types of implications, and of its growing attention to the possibility of misrepresentation by implication, are discussed in detail. A prediction is offered that attention to implications will continue to increase for some time in the future. Puffery is discussed as a category which the FTC might recognize in the future as a type of implied misrepresentation; a rationale is offered for regulating such claims. The role of the researcher is examined, using the assumption that greater attention to misrepresentation that extends beyond a messages literal meaning will produce a greater need for research. The researcher will have attractive opportunities for such work, but will have to confront the problem that playing an advocacy role in legal proceedings may involve significant conflicts with the impartial role that is appropriate for the academic researcher.

A Reinterpretation of the Meaning of Involvement in Krugman's Models of Advertising Communication

The finding that brands advertised on TV are relatively more difficult to differentiate than those in magazines provides an alternate explanation of why the degree of consumer involvement with advertising is less for TV than for magazines.

Puffery–A Problem the FTC Didn't Want (and May Try to Eliminate)

There is some evidence to suggest that people do rely upon puffery as fact and thus place themselves in a position to be deceived by that which is not true.

Perceiving Advertisements as Emotional, Rational and Irrational

f i The study reported here tested the ability of two theoretical formulations to predict readers’ perceptions of the “emotionality” and “rationality-irrationality” of advertisements. The results permit us to re-assess the old issues of whether or not “emotional” and “rational” are opposite types of appeals, and whether or not they allow a classification of advertising in some useful way. In the past, identifications of emotional and rational communications have been made by searching messages for the presence of selected characteristics.1 This may fail because the communicator’s (or experimenter’s) label-

Reflections on a career in communication research as used in investigating puffery and other internet advertising claims for deceptiveness

The paper summarises a career in communication research and theory that has concentrated on the use of such study in legal procedures involving deceptiveness, which the law identifies by using communication concepts. Also emphasised are advertising claims on the internet that have been found to be deceptive.